Criminal justice reporter

Athens-Clarke police on Monday charged a juvenile and two adults with murder in connection with the burglary of a home on Jefferson River Road in which an elderly resident was fatally shot.

All three suspects in the Nov. 26 shooting death of 76-year-old Edward Davidson already were in custody prior to being charged with Davidson’s murder.

Anthony Fuller, 16, was arrested five days after the deadly burglary, in connection with another burglary. Investigators quickly identified him as a possible suspect, and on Nov. 30, Athens-Clarke police issued a lookout for the Altarstone Drive resident. When located and arrested Dec. 1, Fuller already had a juvenile pick-up order on a burglary charge.

Another murder suspect, 22-year-old Justin Oneal Baughns, was arrested Dec. 5 on a theft-by-receiving charge, according to Clarke County Jail records.

At the time of his arrest, Baughns was out on bond following his arrest earlier this year on robbery and theft charges.

Dwayne Tavares Myers, 30, was the last suspect to be picked up. He was arrested last Wednesday when Athens-Clarke police and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation executed search warrants at his home at 250 Lavender Road.

Authorities are not commenting on the case, according to news release issued by police late Monday afternoon.

Though murder charges weren’t lodged until days later, Myers was arrested during last week’s search as a suspect in another burglary that occurred two days before Davidson was killed.

The Nov. 24 burglary bore similarities to the break-in at Davidson’s home in that both happened late at night and the residences were occupied at the time. After a suspect kicked in the door of a home on Arch Street, he fled upon turning on a light in a bedroom and realizing that a woman was there, according to the incident report.

Davidson also was in bed at the time his door was kicked in. Police said he was shot when he left his room to confront the burglars. His wife, Charlotte, was on the phone with a 911 dispatcher at the time and told of looking out the bedroom window and seeing two black males run away.

In the days and weeks after Davidson was killed, police focused on the possibility that the suspects lived in or around Davidson’s neighborhood or had committed other burglaries in that area.

Like Myers, Baughns lived on Lavender Road, and their homes are located a little more than a mile from where Davidson and his wife lived.

In addition to intensive investigation by police, the murder charges apparently also resulted from assistance authorities received from the community,

“The positive outcome to this investigation was due to courageous citizens who provided information, as well as the diligence and hard work of members of the ACCPD and the GBI,” Athens-Clarke police noted in the news release.

Authorities had offered a reward of at least $2,000 for information that assisted the murder investigation. In addition the local Crime Stoppers and Gov. Nathan Deal’s office, the GBI promised to contribute an undisclosed amount to the reward, based on the quality of the information.

Troy Davidson, one of the shooting victim’s 10 children, previously stated that his family planned to contribute to the reward all the money that people had donated to a fund set up at a local bank following his father’s murder.

Though Fuller was charged with murder as an adult, he is incarcerated at the Gainesville Regional Youth Detention Center due to his age, police said.

And as a juvenile, there is no public record of Fuller establishing a criminal history.

However, Baughns made news several times over the past year, once as a so-called Craigslist robber. Police suspected he arranged to meet with as many as five people who advertised merchandise for sale on the popular website, then stole the items from the sellers.

A Clarke County grand jury in January indicted Baughns for two of the Craigslist robberies.

The man was also named as a member of the “Boss Playaz” street gang in a search warrant unrelated to the Craigslist robberies.

Myers has an extensive history of arrests and convictions, according to court records.

He was paroled from state prison on Oct. 24, just one month before Davidson was killed, after he served a little more than a year for a conviction on a charge of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

That conviction stemmed from a 2010 arrest in which police said Myers shot at another man. Prosecutors dismissed an aggravated assault charge because authorities were unable to locate the alleged victim.

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